Hamilton takes pole, Bottas P2 for resurgent Mercedes front row lockout in F1 return to Paul Ricard; Vettel P3 for Ferrari
Mercedes and Lewis Hamilton appeared back on the pace in Forumla 1’s return to France two weeks after their disappointing showing in Canada. Championship contender Lewis Hamilton, who lost his points lead after two lackluster outings in Monaco and Montreal, put his newly upgraded engine to good use on the strange and colorful Paul Ricard circuit, pipping his teammate Valtteri Bottas for pole by just over a tenth. It made for a satisfying front row lockout for the Silver Arrows and, despite the somewhat unknown nature of a track that F1 has been absent from for 28 years, puts the factory Mercedes team in good position to reclaim winning momentum come Sunday.
Points leader Sebastian Vettel qualified third for Ferrari, which appeared down on overall power to the new generation of Mercedes engines. Worse still for the Scuderia, their second driver Kimi Raikkonen couldn’t get it together and only mustered the 6th best time. Raikkonen saw himself out-qualified by the trimmed-out Red Bull’s of Max Verstappen and Daniel Ricciardo, who will start P4 and P5 respectively. Carlos Sainz carried the colors for the French Renault team by qualifying an excellent P7. Charles Leclerc showed once again that he is a young driver to watch as he willed his usually pokey Sauber up to the eight grid spot. And Haas rounded out the top 10 starters, with Kevin Magnussen starting P9 and Romain Grosjean qualifying tenth fastest. However, the Frenchman Grosjean rather took the bloom off his achievement by having a lurid spin that led to a Red Flag period mid-Q3 but thankfully only damaged the Haas’s front wing. In Grosjean’s case, Paul Ricard’s unique and ubiquitous red and blue “friction stripes” in lieu of gravel traps showed their slowing power to excellent effect.
A week after winning Le Mans Fernando Alonso returned to the reality of a surprisingly poor McLaren machine. Both he and his teammate Stoffel Vandoorne failed to make it out of Q1, a decisive setback for McLaren after some small signs of hope this season. Williams horror season also continued, as both their cars were inexplicably the slowest in the field.
Top 10 qualifiers or the French GP:
| POS | DRIVER | Q1 | Q2 | Q3 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 1:31.271 | 1:30.645 | 1:30.029 | |
| 2 | 1:31.776 | 1:31.227 | 1:30.147 | |
| 3 | 1:31.820 | 1:30.751 | 1:30.400 | |
| 4 | 1:31.531 | 1:30.818 | 1:30.705 | |
| 5 | 1:31.910 | 1:31.538 | 1:30.895 | |
| 6 | 1:31.567 | 1:30.772 | 1:31.057 | |
| 7 | 1:32.394 | 1:32.016 | 1:32.126 | |
| 8 | 1:32.538 | 1:32.055 | 1:32.635 | |
| 9 | 1:32.169 | 1:31.510 | 1:32.930 | |
| 10 | 1:32.083 | 1:31.472 | DNF |
Complete qualifying results available via Formula1.com.
Tomorrow’s race airs live on ESPN2 beginning at 10AM Eastern here in the States. Hope to see you then!